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Talk:Malazan world
I don't think Lether is properly placed. Because of the tundra north of the Edur lands it seems like it should be on the same latitude as Genabackis, which also has tundra to the north. 02:17, September 9, 2013 (UTC)Dalarsco Placement of Lether I have the same general objection that Dalarsco has raised, but see a much bigger problem with the various unofficial maps. While the Jaghut laid down ice in some possibly unnatural places, it still seems clear that a polar climate exists on the extreme (Jhreck) end of Lether, around Jacuruku and at the northern ends of Gennabackris and Seven Cities. These unofficial maps would have the first two locations I listed as being equatorial. The assumption is because the inhabitants of the region talk about "north" when they enter colder areas and the continents are presumed to be in the Southern Hemisphere. I don't know if the hemisphere assumption is based on a direct statement in the books. MT does mention the Malaz Empire as being on the other side of the world, but that could be east/west, rather than north/south. I see four possible explanations: #The supposed southerly continents are in fact east or west of the Seven Cities region. All of these continents extend from north to south across the equator. Little action in the stories takes place in the southern polar region. (Alternatively within this scheme, Jacuruku may be Southerly but not Lether) #The "north" of the languages of the Lether continent corresponds to "South" of the Malaz regions, so that the Eidur live toward the South Pole. #The geophysics of this world do not correspond to those of Earth. Cold regions exist in unexpected places or due to magical/supernatural forces that have shaped the climate. #The writers have not considered this issue sufficiently and the books are incoherent on this point. I admit I have only read the first five books of the Malazan the Fallen series, so a better answer may appear in on of the later books. Ftjrwrites (talk) 15:57, April 15, 2015 (UTC)ftjrwrites Seven Cities and Quon Tali placement Reviewing the maps in the books following my post about Lether, I see additional concerns. Quon Tali clearly has a cold region with ice fields to its north. Seven Cities does not. In fact it's the only major continent that doesn't. HoC described a temperate area of farms, along with some arid deserts and other landscapes, but not really tundra or icefields, in the northern part of Seven Cities. This suggests this continent may be a substantially lower latitude than these other Malazan Empire region continents. It likely crosses the equator, and areas such as Morn may be in cold to temperate portions of the southern hemisphere. It also seems likely that Quon Tali is much further north than these unofficial maps show. I realize this raises some objections because of the sea travels depicted in DG and perhaps elsewhere. But that can be fixed by allowing this continent to be substantially bigger in comparision to Seven Cities than these unofficial maps presently show. This way Malaz island would still be close to the same latitude as Aren. Ftjrwrites (talk) 16:27, April 15, 2015 (UTC)ftjrwrites :Here is what D'rek from the Malazan Forum posted in response to your questions: :I agree with pretty much all those points. :But back when SE would actually comment on maps he said that that was where 7C and the Lether continent were, so Wert started putting the continents like that and the rest followed. :The Quon Tali and 7C positioning comes from the maps themselves though. There's a map of QT with an arrow pointing the direction to Aren, and vice versa. Furthermore, the Falar archipelago is not depicted as being particularly ice-laden. So, one must conclude that the ice in the Fenn Ranges is not due to overall climate - could be Jaghut, could be ultra-high mountains and localized conditions, or could be something else but the rest of the area around it on either side is not arctic. :Egwene of the Malazan Empire (talk) 19:42, April 21, 2015 (UTC) ::Good points. I've noticed that map arrow issue as well. I believe there's a solution to this specific problem. Recall that in DHG, the sea journey from Aren takes Kalam to Malaz City rather than the northwestern portion of QT. This makes sense if QT is much bigger than these maps show. The arrow is just showing the path by ship from Aren to reach the major cities on the southern side of QT. This would allow QT to extend in latitude from just south of Aren to well north of Otaral island. This helps explain why the maps show icefields north of QT, but the climate isn't especially cold at all north of 7C, as we can see from the sea journeys along its north side in TBH. Regarding Lether, I'd be interesting in seeing exactly what the author said on the matter. If Lether is especially big, it could be where he indicated, but extend well to the north. ::Alternatively, climate in this world may have nothing to do with polar regions and be based on other issues, especially the remnants of Jaghut magic. It's clear that this may be solely responsible for the ice on Lether and the fact that the northern regions are coldest isn't meaningful. ::Ftjrwrites (talk) 04:55, April 23, 2015 (UTC)ftjrwrites More responses from the forum: Gorefest wrote: In MoI there are some fragments regarding maps that could be the cop-out to end all cop-outs. If I recall correctly, Paran is contemplating on several occasions how certain geographical landmarks are different from the Malazan campaign maps. I think he at one point is relieved to find that a certain river or mountain range or something like that is closer in real life than it looked on the map. So that raises the question whether the illustrated maps as presented to us in the books are actual representations of the world, or if they are supposed to be 'campaign maps' and as such may not actually be accurate. It feels like a Deus ex Machina to explain away some map issues, and it would be a bit of a below the belt suckerpunch to those who spent ages designing world maps based on the illustrations in the books, but it is disconcerning that SE has his characters remark on this very discrepancy. Tiam is an Imploding Unit wrote: Maps were hugely innaccurate until about the mid 1700's. There's one author I read recently, Miles Cameron, whose maps have been inaccurate on purpose, cause that's just the way they were. Normal climates don't seem to work all that well on Wu anyways. Jakuruku is a humid, warm continent with jungles on one side and a desert/plains (can't rightly remember) on the other, surrounded by ice sheets. That's just the way it is. Andorion wrote: It is a repeatedly emphasised fact that coastlines were changing in Wu. In DG there a mention that Kellanved had the coast of Malaz city excavated and it revealed older port facilities. This showed that water levels were rising. We know, post MT and RG that the Jaghut ice is melting, With rising sea levels there would be changing coastlines and geographies. Plus even stable geographical features change. Raraku went from becoming a desert to a sea. Regarding incorrect maps, SE has made a point of discarding the omniscient narrator trope. If we extend this to the published maps and factor in the idea that most pre-industrial cartography was speculative and full o ferrors, then its quite natural that Malazan maps of Quon Tali and Seven Cities would be far more accurate that Genenbackis, Assail or Lether. Egwene of the Malazan Empire (talk) 10:06, April 24, 2015 (UTC) Background info about the layout from Werthead: Answer The actual answer to why we placed things where we did is unfortunately a lot more boring: Steven Erikson himself actually has a rough working world map. We haven't seen it, but Hetan and Mal (the admins of Malazanempire.com) have and they put up a rough redrawing of it. It looks pretty much exactly like my own and D'rek's maps, including the then very-controversial placement of Lether, the very small size of Quon Tali and so on. The only thing that's changed are the coastlines of Jacuruku and Assail as they were added to the book maps (and thus became canon). Of course, nothing is 100% settled until official world maps appear, but as of right now the fan maps appear to align pretty closely with word of Steven (and ICE). Werthead (talk) 20:50, May 14, 2015 (UTC) Category:Talk pages